Francis

Update on Francis

Francis is a 25-year-old micro-entrepreneur who operates his own mobile money transfer business at Nakonde boarder. This is a boarder post between Zambia and Tanzania. The business is his only source of income, and he works very hard to service his customers so that he can earn additional income.

Francis received his first Kiva loan in May of 2012. He said that his business changed dramatically upon receiving the loan because he had more cash at his business to serve more customers. After this, he enrolled at the University of Zambia to pursue a degree in education while simultaneously operating his mobile money business.

Now, Francis has hired an employee to assist him with the day-to-day transactions at his business. Francis in now requesting a loan so that he can increase his cash on hand to serve more customers. Francis explains how the demand at the boarder post is very high and consequently requires a good cash flow to serve his customers more efficiently.

With his additional profit from serving more customers, Francis plans to open another outlet. His goal is to become a successful, well educated businessman in his community.

Previous Loan Details

Meet 25-year-old Francis; he owns a mobile money transfer business in Nakonde district. His shop is located on the border of Zambia and Tanzania. The town where his shop is located is one of the biggest border towns in Zambia, with a high traffic of business taking place. This is his story....
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More from Francis's previous loan »

Additional Information

More information about this loan

This loan is a combination of the following: 1) Capital Growth Loan: An asset-based loan provided to both existing and new Zoona agents for setting-up or expanding their mobile transactions business. Part of the amount is an in-kind loan to enable agents to acquire assets for their mobile transaction business. For existing agents, the loan is designed to inject medium-term working capital assistance to purchase additional assets or expand to new locations thereby helping their businesses grow. 2) Electronic Float Advance: Short-term liquidity assistance to qualifying Zoona agents to allow them to make mobile money payments when their electronic balance is too low to meet their immediate business needs. The loan is intended to provide borrowers with a boost to their electronic float to allow them to handle more revenue generating transactions and also give them a means to support transactions during peak demands. The borrowers will be able to draw down their electronic advance on a per-transaction basis. There are no monthly repayments, rather the borrowers will earn less commission on per transaction basis on the funds utilized from the advance. Repayments will include fixed monthly repayments for the capital growth portion and a bullet payment at the end of an 18-month term for the electronic float advance. By supporting this loan, you’re helping an entrepreneur set up or expand their business.

About Zoona:

Zoona is a mobile money operator that invests in emerging entrepreneurs in Africa who are transforming their communities.

In Africa, there is a tremendous pool of entrepreneurs, business owners, and young people who dream of making money and serving their communities but who are struggling to find the resources and support to reach their full potential.

Zoona offers entrepreneurs an opportunity to build their own businesses and create wealth and employment through mobile payment solutions, financial services, business management tools and support.

The network of Zoona outlets in urban and rural areas enables unbanked and financially excluded individuals the ability to transact in an easy, quick and safe manner with family, friends, and other service providers. This is a step change improvement in countries like Zambia, where the majority of transactions are still conducted in cash and are thus inefficient, insecure, and expensive. Zoona's unique model of enabling emerging entrepreneurs to provide mobile money services to consumers has the potential to significantly push the boundaries of financial inclusion in Africa.

Concurrent and Successive Loans

Our Field Partners often work with borrowers over a series of loans as the borrowers build credit, take out bigger loans, and expand their businesses. In order to make it easier for our Field Partners to post loans for borrowers who have been listed on Kiva before, we allow them to post successive and concurrent loans for their Kiva borrowers. This means that our Field Partners are able to post a borrower's second, third, etc., loan on Kiva without having to re-enter all of the borrower's information.

This borrower has been listed on Kiva before, so you'll see an updated loan description, as well as excerpts of the original descriptions from earlier loans. Most borrowers take out loans consecutively, meaning that they receive a second loan after having repaid the first. However, sometimes our Field Partners give out concurrent loans, allowing borrowers to take out one primary loan and a secondary "add-on" loan along with it. These "add-on" loans are typically smaller than the borrower's primary loan and serve a different purpose. Because Field Partners can now post loans as successive and concurrent loans, you will be able to track borrower progress over time and see the various ways a borrower is working with our Field Partners through funds from Kiva’s lenders.

This photo was used before for a previous loan for Francis. It was first posted on Kiva on Apr, 2013. Learn More

Photo from previous loan

Kiva allows our Field Partners to re-use the same photo for individual borrowers that have been posted on Kiva's website once before in a 24 month period, and we allow them to re-use group photos for up to 24 months, provided that 80% of the current group's membership is represented.

Taking, collecting, and uploading photos of borrowers is one of the most challenging elements of using Kiva for our Field Partners. In order to make Kiva easier for Field Partners to use, we have allowed them to post successive and concurrent loans without taking a new photo of the borrower if the criteria above are met.